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mm WML CiOT SEWSSing ulah tJASB—A Wipe Subs ?or $40,000 rofcServices rendered her Husband—InterestingJudicial Opinion.Supreme Courts General Term—July 28$.Before Judges Davies, Clerke, and Sutherland.Eliza Ann Oropay againat Peter B. Sweeney, Pul* He Administrator.—This action was brought to recover $40,000 for services rendered by plaintiff for James Ridgway in hia lifetime, while plaintiff was standing in the supposed relation of wife. It appears that the marriage ceremony was solemnized between plaintiff and James Ridgway in 1821, plaintiff believing that they were lawfully married. In September, earlier. in the same year, Catharine Ridgway commenced an action for divorce against James Ridgway. He was married to her in 1812, and hor name then wsb Catharine Dob ; and in 1815 he separated from her. In June, 1822, a decree was entered dissolving the marriage. In 1825 the marriage ceremony waa again solemnized between plaintiff and James Ridgway, she believing that he was competent to contract marriage. James Ridgway died in 1847. At the time of the first marriage he was worth about $1000, and at the time of his death he had amassed 150,000. She claims that it was partially owing to her effortB that Mr. Ridgway was enabled to acoumulate the fortune. Tho»e were 12 children by the marriage, eight of whom are now living- Prior to his marriage with Catharine Dob, he had once been married, and had issue by both marriages. One child, Eliza Ann; and one grand child, George W. Ridgway, surviving issue of hiB deceased son Joseph, tho issue of his first marriage; and one grandchild, the sole snrviviug issue of a daughter By his second marriage, claim to bo tho only lawful heirs to James Ridgway.The defendant demurred to the oomplaint, and after the argument at apeoial term the demurrer was overruled. Defendant appealed to the general term and the order of the special term was reversed, and judgment for the defendant was given on the demurrer.Judge Sutherland, who rendered tho decision, held that the Code in abolishing the distinction between aotiona at law and suits in equity did not intend to inittate new principles of law.It ia no longer Decessary, and perhapB not even proper in such a oase, for the plaintiff to allege in his complaint any promise.on the part of tho defendant; but he must state facts, which, if true, according to well-settled principles of law, would have authorized him to allege and the Court to infer a promise on the part of the defendant before the Code.No doubt from the time of the first marriage cere-moDy to the institution of the suit for divoroe and Irom the time of the second marriage ceremony until his death, James Ridgway and the plaintiff both supposed that they wero lawfully married, and that he lived and died supposing that they were man andwife.Now after his death, upon the assumption that his supposed marriage was not lega'j will tho law permit us ' r authorize us to turn this supposed relation of husband and wifo into the relation of muster andservant, and thus infer or imply a promise on thepart of James Ridgway in his life to pay, and an exiffpectation on the part of the plaintiff to receive pay for- the services rendered by the plaintiff while so standing in the supposed relation of husband and wifa.
Newspaper Details
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
Brooklyn, New York, US
Thu, Jul 29, 1858
Page 1
Full Page
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USA 09 Sep 2018
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